-one student's perspective on life as a woman at georgetown university-

This is the greatest sport ever. Do not ever change topics, Seth Davis. Ever.

In a recent article for his his Sports Illustrated column “Hoop Thoughts,” Seth Davis wrote:

Look, I am not here to defend Pitino’s behavior. Over the last 16 months, he was revealed to be to be a lot of things — a fool, a cad, a liar, an adulterer and an egotist. In other words, a sinner.

For those of you who don’t follow college basketball, let me fill you in: Rick Pitino is the coach everyone loves to hate (Hoya Saxa). Recently, his “mistress,” or whatever the hell she was, was charged with extortion because she tried to get money out of him. It is unclear whether or not she was extorting him for sleeping with her consensually or because he raped her. The woman, Karen Cunagin Sypher, has now been convicted of extortion. She is the now the criminal.

Let me share with you a few snippets of why Pitino is the “real victim” here, and he did not commit a crime, according to Seth Davis:

She says Pitino raped her twice, yet she waited six years to confront him about it.

Although the alleged assaults occurred in April 2003, Sypher didn’t file a criminal complaint against Pitino until November 2009, three months after he revealed her alleged extortion attempts to the police and the media, and three months after she was indicted.

She claimed Pitino raped her, yet she met him a few weeks later at the apartment of his equipment manager, Tim Sypher. Pitino gave her $3,000. (The coach says it was for medical insurance, but Sypher used it for an abortion.) Then, she alleges, he raped her a second time while Tim stayed upstairs and did nothing to help her.

She says Pitino raped her twice and that Tim did nothing to help the second time. Yet, eight months later she married Tim Sypher in Nantucket, Mass.

She claimed Pitino raped her that fateful night at Porcini restaurant in Louisville in August 2003. Yet, she allowed him to drive her home later that night. (Pitino denied ever raping Sypher and authorities found no merit to the charges.)

In the interest of full disclosure, I changed the order of the bullets for more shock value. But these are all things Davis says. Check out the article to confirm, if you’d like.

Let’s go through each reason Rick Pitino is a “victim,” one at a time, and calmly (HA) explain to Seth Davis why he should only be writing about basketball – and not about moral integrity, the law, or rape.

I don’t know and I wish I did. Everyone’s been asking me all day: what do you think?(thanks to Emily for letting me know the link was broken – it should be fixed now!)

Sabbar Kashur, 30, was convicted as part of a plea bargain. According to the indictment, Kashur met the complainant in September 2008 in downtown Jerusalem, presenting himself as a Jewish bachelor looking for a serious romantic relationship…The couple then went to a nearby building and had sex, after which Kashur left the building without waiting for the woman to get dressed.

In short, the man turned out to be Arab, and turned out to not be interested in a “serious romantic relationship.” She charged him with rape because “If she hadn’t thought the accused was a Jewish bachelor interested in a serious romantic relationship, she would not have cooperated.”

I don’t know the answer to the question of this man’s guilt, so I don’t want to talk about that. Instead, I’d like to comment on the reaction I heard today, from some incredibly intelligent people, about this article – because I think some of those reactions were kind of surprising, and some were even a little out of line.